21 July 2006

So what now? We're clearly winning the war. We're making documented and verifiable progress. Life is getting better for the average Iraqi. The terrorists are on the run. What do we do now?

We drive on. We strap on our body armor and go back at it. We keep filing reports and pushing paper. We keep doing what we're doing. And we get better at it. We keep accomplishing the mission.

Iraq has made and continues to make amazing progress towards building a stable democratic government that can manage a stable country. If the decision is made that there are too many bad men with guns than we are willing to deal with and we get sent home we will leave the developing Iraqi Security Forces to fend for themselves. We would have abandoned Iraq to terrorists and murderers.

We must stay the course. It's working. We're winning.

Yes there are still bad men who blow up innocent Iraqis and provide gruesome headlines with highly printable body counts that drown out the positive stories. Does that mean that we're losing? Does that mean that we should go home?

The terrorists know they can't win militarily. In large-scale combat they get their butt kicked every time. The people of Iraq see life getting better despite the terrorist attacks. The terrorists are losing what little popular support they had to begin with. So how are they going to beat us? How can they win?

I think those last three lines say it all. Leaving now would simply make everything we've done to this point moot, and ensure that we'd be doing it all over again in another ten years. We're in it to win it, now.

In downtown Milwaukee last week I saw a large bunch of new Army recruits as they waited for the bus to training. They were sharp looking young men and women. I went over and shook hands and told them "thanks for joining up, we love you for volunteering to protect us."

We support you guys and gals big time. Come home safe as you are our next greatest generation.

You have learned for yourself not to trust the news media. Even FoxNews. Please believe me that the newsies are also misleading you when they say we Americans don't support you and don't think we're winning.

We do support you and all our troops and we know we're winning. [We must be, or we'd all be hiding in bunkers from the missiles landing randomly.]

BTW, don't believe the polls, either. They're run by the news media :-)